


love in his eyes and flowers in his hair

by deadratz



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Domestic Hannigram Hell, Established Relationship, Flowers, Hair Braiding, M/M, Mentions of Murder, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, duh - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:20:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28423086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deadratz/pseuds/deadratz
Summary: Will hates having to grow out his hair post-fall. He hates wearing it down, but he hates wearing it in a ponytail. Hannibal suggests an alternative.Alternatively summarized as "if Hannibal and Will grew out their hair post fall to help disguise themselves I think Hannibal’s gay ass would braid Will's hair and put flowers in it"
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 14
Kudos: 150





	love in his eyes and flowers in his hair

**Author's Note:**

> Not beta-read. Written in like an hour. There are probably mistakes.
> 
> Title from a lyric in Going to California by Led Zeppelin just with the pronouns changed

Will pulls the hair tie out of his hair and lets his curls cascade down, over his shoulders and into his face, with a groan of relief. He runs his hair through his scalp in an attempt to ease the tension from the ponytail he wore all day, he runs his fingers down the lengths to try and smooth out the crease the binder made. 

Long hair is a bitch, especially with his curls. He knows it’s necessary if he and Hannibal want to stay undetected, but it comes with pain. When he goes out, he wears it down, an attempt to cover the scars on his face, and frame his features differently than one would recognize, but at home he keeps it back, out of his face. He works on boat motors at their house, and it wouldn’t be wise to let his hair fall loosely around them. 

Hannibal comes into the room while Will is massaging his scalp and swats his hands away to finish the job. He stands behind Will, leaning over the back of the couch that Will sits on, and Will lets out a moan of pleasure as Hannibal’s skillful fingers massage his aching head. Hannibal presses a kiss to the side of his neck and Will can feel his smile against his skin.

“You do not need to keep your hair so tightly bound, darling. It pulls too harshly at your scalp, and that’s why you’re getting so many headaches,” Hannibal murmurs against his skin. Hannibal stands up straight again, but doesn’t remove his hands from Will’s hair. 

“Well, I can’t cut my hair. We’ve talked about this,” Will replies. He tilts his head back to look up at Hannibal who smiles fondly down at him. 

Hannibal’s hair falls into his face and he makes no attempt to tuck it behind an ear, as if it doesn’t bother him at all. Maybe it doesn’t. He never pulls it back unless he’s drawing, killing, cooking or doing other things where it might get in the way. Will envies Hannibal’s patience and ability to not think about the way his hair feels, the loose strands that tickle his nose, or when he’s sweaty and it sticks to his neck. Will can’t stand any of that stuff. 

“No, you are correct. But there are other ways to keep it out of your face, my dear,” Hannibal says. He leans down to kiss Will on the lips, then stands again. Will is about to reach for him to come back, when Hannibal rounds the end of the couch and sits down next to Will, pulling his feet up next to him and leaning into his side. 

“You care to elaborate?” Will raises an eyebrow. He tilts his face down to look at Hannibal, then finds one of his hands to hold in his own. He sets them both on his thigh and waits for Hannibal to continue. 

“Do you need it out of your face right now?” Hannibal asks quietly. He nuzzles his face into Will’s shoulder like a cat and Will feels the urge to pet his head. He ignores it in favor of answering Hannibal’s question.

“I’m not doing anything right now besides sitting here with you and going to bed as soon as you get off me,” Will tells him. He knows it’s not quite an answer, but really, he never wants his hair in his face, but he doesn’t need it out of his face, either. 

“Well, then in the morning perhaps I’ll loosely braid your hair for you,” Hannibal says. He presses his lips to Will’s shoulder and stands. He pulls Will up by their conjoined hands. “It will be less punishing on your head than those ponytails you’ve been doing.” 

“You know how to braid hair?” Will asks as Hannibal leads him to the bedroom. 

“Well, of course,” Hannibal shrugs. “I used to braid my sister’s hair for her. That’s why I learned.”

“And you still remember?” 

Hannibal shrugs again. “There have been times over the years where I have braided the hair of my victims for displays. It’s not as though I am entirely out of practice.” 

Will hums in response. He doesn’t want to think about how many corpses Hannibal has braided the hair for in his life, and he’ll happily push that thought aside. Still, he’ll do anything to fix his problem and if Hannibal is confident in his hair styling skills, then Will is going to let him at least try. 

In the morning, Will wakes up to the smell of breakfast cooking and sighs. Normally Hannibal stays in bed until he wakes up, but it must be late this morning. Or Hannibal was just too restless to stay still. A look at the clock tells him that it’s the latter, not late at all. Too early, to be exact. It’s just past 4 in the morning and Will wonders if Hannibal slept at all.

More often than not, Hannibal will wake up in the middle of the night, either to Will’s nightmares or his own. Even so long after their plummet into the Atlantic, they still hold onto those memories, those few seconds suspended above the water, seemingly falling to their deaths. Will has apologized countless times for what he had done, but Hannibal just tells him he has no ill feelings towards it. 

Will knows that each time Hannibal wakes up gasping for air, it’s out of a nightmare where he couldn’t get any. Submerged under the water, clinging desperately to each other. Will knows because he has the same dreams and wakes in the same way. 

Why Hannibal didn’t wake him up confuses him, and he sits up, swings his legs out of bed and gets up. He shuffles on his feet out to the kitchen, yawning and rubbing his eyes as he goes. He sees Hannibal at the stove, cooking what appears to be an omelette. He stands there in nothing but his boxers, his hair pushed back under a bandana.

Hannibal looks up from the stove and smiles weakly at Will. Will stands, leaning against the doorframe. 

“What’s goin on, baby?” Will mumbles sleepily, voice not quite working yet.

“I woke up and didn’t want to wake you.”

“So you’re cooking?” Will yawns. 

Hannibal nods. “It clears my mind.”

Will crosses the kitchen and leans into Hannibal’s back, wrapping his arms around him from behind. “And what’s on your mind?”

Hannibal doesn’t answer and Will squeezes his arms around him tighter. 

“Hannibal,” Will tries. “Complete honesty, remember? We agreed.”

“I know, my love,” Hannibal says with a sigh. He reaches forward and turns off the burner, the plates the eggs he was making. Hannibal takes a breath and then removes Will’s arms from around him so he can turn and face him. Then, he says, “I realize just how many things you have sacrificed for me. Just to keep my freedom.”

“And mine, too. We’re in too deep to think of ourselves singularly like that,” Will says firmly. He has no idea where this is all coming from. They’ve been on the run for over a year, going on two. Surely, Hannibal knows by now that he's not the only one making sacrifices, nor is Will only making them for Hannibal.

“No, you are correct, but…” Hannibal trails off. His eyes close and he takes a breath again. Will reaches out and touches his cheek, running his thumb along his sharp cheekbone. “I have told you I don’t wish to see you in pain anymore, yes?”

Hannibal opens his eyes and Will nods. Will takes a step closer so they’re chest to chest and Hannibal wraps his arms around Will, putting his chin on top of Will’s head.

“You should cut your hair if it’s bothering you. I am aware of how much you hate the length and how it feels, and how your headaches are caused by the ponytails. You’ve sacrificed too much for me, I don’t wish to see you with so much discomfort.” 

Will can’t help but laugh against Hannibal’s neck. He pulls back to look at him. “It’s just hair, Hannibal. It’s not like you’re asking me to cut off a finger every day, or something.” 

“That would only last for ten days.”

“Jesus Christ, really? You know what I mean,” Will laughs. He pats Hannibal’s chest with a hand, then says, “I will be perfectly fine, and I will get used to it with time. Please just believe me. It’s not a sacrifice, it’s a minor inconvenience that will help us stay unapprehended for the foreseeable future.” 

Hannibal sighs and opens his mouth to say something, but Will knows his tells, knows what he looks like when he’s going to start a lecture and he leans up to kiss Hannibal on the mouth to shut him up. 

“I know you’re not actually hungry, so throw that away and come back to bed,” Will requests. He doesn’t wait for Hannibal to react before he opens the trash can and dumps the omelette in, then sets the plate in the sink. 

In the morning, as promised, Hannibal braids Will’s hair. Will sits on the floor in front of the couch between Hannibal’s legs, and lets him French braid his hair. It’s not too tight to cause pain, but tight enough so nothing falls loose. Starting from Will’s hairline, and going over the top of his head, and down the back, Hannibal pulls hair from the sides to make one large braid.

When he gets to the base of Will’s skull, he braids the last of it, then ties it off. He sets his hands on Will’s shoulders and Will can tell he’s thinking about something. 

“Just one moment,” Hannibal murmurs. He then stands up and carefully steps over Will to disappear into their bedroom. When he comes back, he’s holding several hair pins and Will wants to protest, hating how they pull at his hair, but Hannibal gives him a look that Will knows as Hannibal’s way of asking for trust. So Will relaxes his tense shoulders and lets Hannibal step over him again to settle back on the couch behind him.

Hannibal lifts the end of the braid and secures it to the braid weaved on the back of his skull. 

“There, now it won’t touch the back of your neck,” Hannibal says. 

Will brings a hand to touch the back of his head and sure enough, it’s secure and doesn’t fall back down into place. 

“Thank you,” Will whispers. 

Hannibal kisses the top of his head and says, “You’re welcome.”

All their mornings spent at home go in a similar way. Hannibal braids Will’s hair in the same manner before each kill, braids it before he works on boat engines, before he fishes or cooks. Will has decideds it’s much better than the tight ponytails, and leagues better than just leaving it down. 

Will figures he can ask Hannibal to teach him, but he enjoys the feeling of Hannibal doing it, so he doesn’t.

One morning they decide to go to the market and Will leaves his hair down whenever they leave the house. No one pays them any mind as they walk through the farmers market, Will holding a basket while Hannibal chooses things from the stalls. 

Back at home, Hannibal goes right to cooking lunch and Will frowns, wishing Hannibal would braid his hair for him before, but he doesn’t say anything. 

“Darling, will you get a blanket and go set it on the ground outside? I would like to have a picnic today,” Hannibal says. 

Will does as he’s asked and holds the door open while Hannibal brings the food outside in a picnic basket. 

While they eat, Will keeps brushing his hair out of his face, pushing it behind his ears, flipping it over his shoulder. It’s on his nerves, but Hannibal hasn’t made any indication he wants to help Will with the solution. Finally, he pulls the hair tie off of his wrist and throws his hair into one of his dreaded ponytails with a frustrated groan.

Hannibal notices this and smiles. “You could have asked.”

Will huffs and takes a sip of his wine. He mumbles into the glass, “You normally just do it.”

“Well, then I suppose I’ll do it now. Come sit in front of me.”

Will crawls across the blanket to settle between Hannibal’s legs and sighs when Hannibal gently pulls the hair tie out of his hair. He gathers the hair at the front of Will’s head and begins to braid it, following down the middle of his skull until he reaches the base. He braids the rest, ties it, then pins it in place, just as he always does. 

“Stay here,” Hannibal says. He pushes himself off the ground and walks to the edge of the woods near their house. Will watches him pick wild flowers, a whole handful of them, then bring them back. Will raises an eyebrow at Hannibal and Hannibal just gives him a smile in return. 

He settles back on the ground behind Will and starts poking the flower stems into the braid. 

“Turning me into a murder tableau?” Will smirks. 

Hannibal kisses the side of his neck, a smile pressed into his skin. “Of course not, my love. I just couldn’t help myself.” 

“Are you going to start putting flowers in it all the time?’ Will asks. 

“Do you want me to?” 

“I wouldn’t mind,” Will answers.

Will thinks it’s beautiful. It’s not the braids, or the flowers. Not by a longshot. It’s the fact that Hannibal would do anything to make Will happy. After everything, they’ve chosen each other and Will thinks he would sacrifice anything and everything to keep that. 

**Author's Note:**

> Please leave comments and kudos!


End file.
